Trombones not condensing

Hello, again, and sorry to bother you all with my condensing again (!).

In the attached excerpt, you’ll notice that trombones 1, 2 in mm. 8-14 are not condensing. This is really weird. What’s even stranger: as I was preparing this cut-down version of the score and was removing players, I noticed that removing certain ones allowed the trombones to condense normally. So I Removed all the players that didn’t effect the condensing and left only those that do. The result is, if your computer behaves like mine, when you remove any of the instruments other than trombone 1 or 2, then the trombones will condense.

When this passage was in the middle of an orchestra piece, I removed all measures before the passage (what is now m. 9) and then the trombones in that passage would condense. In the full score, after only one system/page of not condensing, the trombones return to their normal condensing. I can’t show you any of that because the score is too big to upload.

So what is going on here?! How can I get the trombones to condense properly without removing players?

If you’re wondering: Yes. This is an XML import, so that may be causing the problem.

Trombone Condensing.dorico (3.4 MB)

In Notation Options > Condensing set Pitch Crossing to Allow unlimited pitch crossing

Thanks for the help, Vadian. That works for the passage in question, but unfortunately the passage just before it ends up looking too complex (see attached screenshot).

I thought turning off “unlimited pitch crossing” would only effect systems that include pitch crossing. Why would it still be influencing the system after the pitch crossing? Is that normal?

I think turning off unlimited pitch crossing will cause some pretty complex tangles of notes/voices in other places of the piece too. If I have to chose one or the other, I’ll probably chose having a system of trombones not condensing over having too much complex pitch crossing.

Thanks for the suggestion, though. It actually does work!

Having set global options that work for the majority of cases at Library > Notation Options > Condensing, note that you can override them locally from any selected object/barline by (in Engrave mode) going Engrave > Condensing Change, ticking the relevant players in the left side and overriding them in the right side. These overrides continue until the end of the Flow or the next Condensing Change that resets same players and options; whichever comes first.

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Thanks for the reminder about that @pianoleo . I did actually try to make a condensing change where the trombones aren’t condensing, but that didn’t work. So if I really want that system of trombones to condense, I’ll have to change the option to allow unlimited pitch crossing throughout the entire piece (which isn’t my preference) and then cancel condensing wherever I don’t like the voice crossing.

It still doesn’t make sense to me that music not on the same system as the voice-crossed passage should still be effected by the “no voice crossing” option. But alas…

No, you can tell Notation Options to prohibit pitch crossing, then set a Condensing Change where you want it to start a new phrase and allow pitch crossing, then set another Condensing Change and turn off unlimited pitch crossing.

As to why stuff on another system or another page affects the way Dorico condenses this system/page, let me quote a lengthier post I typed yesterday:

Thanks for taking the time to post all this information @pianoleo !
Actually, there are 6 1/2 measures of rests after the voice-crossing passage to where I want normal condensing to be implemented. So I thought that should make Dorico start a new phrase and thus new condensing when the trombones re-enter. Originally, my global setting was to not include too much voice crossing. So the voice-crossed passage wasn’t condensing (all good!). But after 6 1/2 measures of rest, the next phrase was still not condensing (not good). The very first thing I tried to do was set a condensing change where I want normal condensing to resume. That didn’t work. I’m still baffled by what happened. It doesn’t seem to match any of the descriptions I’ve read and what you’re describing here.

I hope the attached screenshot isn’t too small to see. It shows the final result I got using my complicated method. Just by looking at trombones 1, 2, though, it looks to me like they should have been condensing on the right-hand page without me having to do anything (because of the long rest between phrases). That’s why I’m still baffled.